• There’s No Place Like Stuck

    by  • April 25, 2012 • Warrior's Path • 8 Comments

    Fellow readers, this Warrior is stuck creatively.

    It’s persisted for over a month and it’s past the point where I can cast it off and have confidence that it will pass soon. Now it’s reached the point where I’m wondering if this feeling will linger. And that is a scary place to be.

    In an attempt to shake myself out of this funk, I’ve made a choice to share with you my creative rut. I’ve said previously that I’d like my writing to come from a vulnerable place and this is a perfect opportunity to share that with you.

    Photo Credit: Elsie esq. (Creative Commons)

    The Empty Tank

    Intuitively I know that this blockage began after my challenge of blogging every day for 2 weeks ended. I felt tapped out of ideas and the topics that had previously come to me frequently had now grown silent. It was as if I had spent so much of my creative energy that after the 2 weeks was finished I had an empty tank. Yet here I sit, 4 weeks later and my tank is still empty.

    The Excuses

    Today I’m choosing to put my “butt in the chair” as a friend of mine told me recently and share my story publicly. Leading up until now, I had made excuses for my lack of motivation to write.

    • I had chalked it up to spending so much time and energy posting every day for 2 weeks

    • I have been dealing with a lot at home

    • Work has been busy

    • My marathon training is ramping up (I’m a month away from the race)

    • I’m working on releasing a big project VERY soon here on this site

    All of which are valid reasons, however I’ve reached the point where I’m finished with excuses and I’m calling it what it is: I’m stuck! It is my hope that by labeling it, talking about it, and sharing it all with you that I’ll begin to see the creative energy restored.

    How do I get out?

    So here I am fellow reader, stuck in a creative rut with no clear path of how I’m going to get out. This is where I’m at. However, by simply writing this post I can already feel the blockage eroding away.

    One thing I know is that I’m NOT going to give up. If you find yourself in a similar situation, please don’t give up hope and keep the faith that your voice will return. We will pass this test.

    Wisdom from Adam Lasky

    My friend Adam Lasky recently wrote on the topic of being stuck and battling your inner monster (his term for fear, doubt, resistance, etc.). I liked his perspective:

    “It means that you might be doing something right.  Something meaningful.  Think about it: if you were just playing around at being a creative and staying safely in the dreamer’s phase, your inner monster would not be seriously threatened.

    So the fact that your inner monster has resulted to blitzkrieg tactics means you are on the right track.  No one takes an amateur seriously.  But someone who is determined, passionate, and consistently creating is a danger to the established order.”

    I like the sound of that!

    It helps me to re-frame my lack of energy to write and create and gives me the confidence to “put my butt in the chair” again tomorrow with the intent of making a little more progress than I did today. That’s how I’ll break through and refill my tank.

    6 Suggestions to Help Break Through

    If you find yourself stuck creatively, here are 6 suggestions to help break through:

    1. Admit that you’re stuck.

    2. Take a deep breath.

    3. Give yourself empathy for being stuck, it happens to us all.

    4. Talk to a friend or mentor about being stuck.

    5. Put your butt in the chair the next day and create a little more than you did yesterday.

    6. Share your struggles publicly.

    Belief and Determination

    It’s a slow process to getting stuck and it’s a slow process to getting unstuck. The most important thing to possess is determination. That emotion will propel you forward every day and before you know it you’ll find yourself unstuck and not quite sure when that happened.

    I believe in you and I believe in me to get out of this. Our messages are too important to hold us down for too long.

     

     

    What have you done to get yourself out of being stuck creatively?

    Please share what’s worked and what hasn’t worked for you.

     

    Photo Credit: Elsie esq. (Creative Commons)

     

    About

    I'm Dave and I help empower you to become the person you were meant to be, rather than the person every one else wants you to be. We are called to be something more and I want to help you understand what that is. With the intent on growing as a person. If you'd like some more information about me, you can read more here.

    • http://www.zahndrew.com/ Andrew Zahn

      For me it’s input/output. What am I feeding myself? What am I reading, doing, and am I resting and taking 5-10 minutes a day to do NOTHING. To let my mind wander.

      Ideas don’t often come when we think “I’ve got to come up with 10 ideas right NOW.” Ideas come when we go about our day, enjoying life and being observant in the process. 

      I loved your vulnerability in admitting to where you’re at in this post. As you said so well the blockages are probably already starting to fall away. 

      • http://warriordave.com/ Dave Lukas

         Totally agree on the input/output concept. If I’m not feeding myself, how can I expect to create good content?

        The process of writing and then publishing this post have already done wonders for removing the blockages. It’s amazing! I can already feel it going away and my creative tank filling up once more.

    • http://www.adamlasky.com/ Adam Lasky

      Love this post, Dave.  The authenticity is there, man.  And I’ve been there.  Believe me.  It sucks.  But the hardships during the creative process is sometimes even more powerful than the finished product.  Out of struggle our greatest creations are forged.  And I agree with Andrew about the “I’ve got to come up with 10 ideas right now” mentality.  We can’t conjure up creativity.  We can’t turn it on and off at will.  All we can do is exactly what you said: put your butt in the chair and battle.  Keep battling, man.  You’re on to something big.  The resistance knows that.  That’s why it’s fighting tooth and nail to defeat you.  Fight on!

      • http://warriordave.com/ Dave Lukas

         Thanks Adam!

        I loved how you described the struggles, so true! Wouldn’t it be great if we could flip a switch and be creative?! Since we don’t have that, we have to battle every day and that’s the lesson I’ve learned through this process. I was waiting for it to come back until a friend and your post helped me take my power back.

        Your post put a great spin on it and made me realize that the resistance and my inner monster are fighting hard now cause I’m close to something big. Thanks for the inspiration Adam!

    • http://twitter.com/tdiddy1234 Todd Foley

      It’s always great to hear your own struggles normalized by someone else. I’ve felt in an extreme creative rut as well lately. Projects at work have been demanding my time and creative juices, social/family activities have taken up a lot of time in the evenings, I’m dealing with immigration difficulties and my book project has turned more administrative rather than creative (aka getting the publishing titles and accounts set up). All super important things, but I find that all the “noise” can be incredibly exhausting. I find that the best way to battle this resistance is to force myself to unplug from everything and everyone for a short while and then come back (hopefully) refreshed. I agree with Adam: You’re on to something VERY big. Darkness loses its power the more light you shed on it. Keep it up brother!

      • http://warriordave.com/ Dave Lukas

         That’s why I write what I do, to normalize it all. Whether it’s about writing or life, we all face the same struggles. There is power in knowing that other people face the same battles so that we can overcome them.

        Unplugging is a good way to get away from the noise. That’s one of the many reasons I love running cause out there I’m not thinking about that stuff. It’s just me.

        I’m going to have a post in the near future about unplugging and the method I use to do that. Stay tuned!

        Thanks for the kind words Todd, it’s wonderful to hear the support.

    • http://twitter.com/tdiddy1234 Todd Foley

      P.S. I wrote a post about the “noise” issue a while back: 
      http://scribbledrevisions.com/2012/03/28/confessions-of-a-noise-addict/

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